Stephen Hawking has warned Artificial Intelligence (AI) ‘could spell the end of the human race.’ Microsoft genius Bill Gates (pictured) said he could not understand why people are not concerned about AI. American Nobel Prize laureate Herbert Simon said: “It is not my aim to surprise or shock you—but the simplest way I can summarize is to say that there are now in the world machines that can think, that can learn and that can create. Moreover, their ability to do these things is going to increase rapidly until – in a visible future – the range of problems they can handle will be coextensive with the range to which the human mind has been applied.” He famously said, “A proper study of mankind is the science of design.”

Albert Einstein said it best: “The mathematical precision of the universe reveals the mathematical mind of God.”

Fast forward to May 2016. Elon Musk is the billionaire CEO of SpaceX and Tesla. He met with the US Secretary of Defense Ash Carter. The Defense Department spokesman Peter Cook said the meeting was ‘to find out what is going on in the world of innovation.’ Musk is a South African born American, who is listed as 38 in the world’s most powerful people. He has a personal fortune of more than $13 billion. His company Tesla is pioneering the world of fully-electric cars and at SpaceX he is pioneering space technology.

At a meeting of technical entrepreneurs Musk declared artificial intelligence is on the verge of changing our lives. Musk said we will need to have ‘neural laces’ implanted in the brain to keep up with the sophisticated computer data world. Neural laces were first mentioned in the Cultural novels by Iain M. Banks. Annalee Newitz, a prolific science and culture writer-editor wrote about ‘neural laces’ as ‘ A mesh that grows with your brain, it’s essentially a wireless brain-computer interface. But it’s also a way to program your neurons to release certain chemicals with a thought. And now, there’s a neural lace prototype in real life.” (Scientists Just Invented Neural Lace, Newitz, gizmodo.com)

Primates

Brain implants have been tested on primates for the last five years. Their decision-making ability was improved by implanting an electrode array into their cerebral cortex. George Dvorsky, a Canadian specialist wrote: “Looking ahead to the future, and assuming safety and ongoing efficacy, it may even be possible to apply a similar intervention to healthy humans.”

Already a large workforce in Japan has been replaced by robots to interact with humans. A hotel in north Japan is totally run by robots.

I watched a YouTube presentation hosted by Mark Dice. In it he showed the most advanced artificial intelligence robot offering to destroy humans. That glitch was laughed off but it may provide a grim warning. Apparently Elon Musk posted that Killer Robots would be functioning by 2019 but that remark was quickly deleted. We do know some nations are considering replacing human soldiers with robots, a fact nearing reality. Stephen Wozniak, cofounder of Apple said, “if a computer is 100 times better than our brain, will it make the world perfect? Probably not, it will probably end up just like us, fighting.”

Human robots are a reality today. Sex robots are predicted to be in demand and available soon.

In a Reality Club Discussion Elon Musk wrote: “The pace of progress in artificial intelligence is incredibly fast. Unless you have direct exposure to groups like Deepmind, you have no idea how fast – it is growing at a pace close to exponential. The risk of something seriously dangerous happening is in the five year time frame.”

For years Hollywood has been killing humans with robots. The movie Terminator 3 was called ‘the Rise of the Machines.’

“Artificial intelligence will make religion obsolete within our lifetime” is an article by Dylan Love and published by The Daily Dot. I read it and after some consideration asked myself who is the better creator God or man? Let see, God created the universe, a spectacular demonstration.

Man can created brilliantly mainly because we are created in His image. We have gifts and talents capable of great things and we have proven that through the centuries.

Consider this quote from ‘Christianity for Skeptics’ by Steve Kumar and John Heininger: “According to most Christian philosophers, the greatest proof for the existence of God is the cosmic evidence. One of the most profound philosophical questions that has caused many debates and much discussion among philosophers through the centuries is, ‘Why is there something, rather than nothing?’ There is hardly a philosopher worth a grain of salt who has not struggled over this question. Everyone faces it, some ignore it, others deny it, but few answer it. Philosopher John Hicks writes, ‘For when we try to think about this infinitely fascinating universe in which we live we find that we are faced in the end with sheer mystery – the mystery of existence, of why there is a universe at all.’”

When I lived in Jerusalem I watched the people of Israel rely on the Word of God. Specifically they believe His assurances. “Do not fear, for I am with you,’ from Isaiah chapter 41, verse 10.

I read Matthew chapter 10, verse 31 which says, ‘don’t be afraid, you are worth more than many sparrows.” (I guess that means robots too!)

Ron Ross is a Middle East consultant for United Christian Broadcasters (Vision FM). Previously he was radio news editor for Bridges for Peace in Jerusalem, Israel.

About the author

Ron Ross worked as the first Sports Editor at WINTV. In Wollongong. He ran The Hamburger Hut an outreach and discipleship program for youth.
He served with Youth With a Mission in Hawaii, Philippines and Australia. He was senior pastor of the Noosa Baptist Church, Queensland for 9 years. He reported news from Jerusalem for five years and is now the Middle East correspondent for United Christian Broadcasters and travels regularly preaching and teaching.

“Our mission is to take the uncompromising Word of God to all Australians (and the world). To see the sick healed, the oppressed set free and family relationships restored – as well as bringing people to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.”